Dr. K’s Weekly Roundup, March 28

Non-negotiable trad principles; overcoming denialism; mythbusting Africa; philosophical musings; technology apocalypse; liturgical lessons on breviaries, iconoclasm, frequent communion; and more

I will start this week by recommending Timothy Flanders’s excellent overview of the non-negotiable principles of Traditionalism — those principles that unite all trads and distinguish them from their fellow Catholics or Christians. I am grateful to Mr. Flanders, editor of OnePeterFive, for spearheading this new article series.

Denialism must be overcome

Fr. Robert McTeigue, SJ, tells it like it is:

Denial is deeply rooted in bureaucracies. Let’s not forget McTeigue’s Axiom: “Most institutions would rather die than admit to having made a mistake.” After “the New Springtime” to “the Second Pentecost” to “Renew!” to “the New Evangelization” to “Eucharistic Revival,” and now, most recently, to “Synodality” and the newly mandated “Synodality Forever!” this is where we are. Somewhere out there, at least two Catholic members of the People Who Should Really Know Better Club are looking at these numbers and saying to each other, “I don’t know why this is happening. We had all those meetings!”

Inevitably, someone will try to rally us, explaining that if we just start synodaling more earnestly, then all will be well. If only we have a big meeting, and break up into small groups, and then report our findings to the larger group, and if we listen without judging or fixing, and finally produce a report and sponsor a program, then all will be enduringly well. This new program will be even bigger and better and more exciting than “parish clusters” or “parish families” or “missionary hubs” — all euphemisms for the closing of parishes.

A more subtle form of denialism consists in adhering to the myth that the Church in Africa is flourishing — and doing so thanks to Vatican II and the inculturated Novus Ordo. Well, certainly, in some ways it is doing far better than the Church in the decadent modern West; but the actual statistics and a closer on-the-ground analysis reveal what John Paul II would call “lights and shadows.” That’s the topic of my recent interview with Kennedy Hall:

Another kind of denialism concerns the West’s suicidal antinatalism. In his incisive article “Children: Culture and Demography,” Joseph Shaw reflects on two recent books: Paul Morland’s No One Left: Why the World Needs More Children (Forum, 2024) and Catherine Pakaluk’s Hannah’s Children: The Women Quietly Defying the Birth Dearth (Regnery, 2024). Shaw offers a summary of the present demographic situation, it root causes, and its remedies. Of particular interest is the weaving together of industrialization, compulsory education, capitalism, and feminism.

Olivia Jones, in her 1P5 premiere, writes in “The Magnanimous Housewife” about the good of family hierarchy, rightly understood and practiced by husband and wife — and notes, in passing, that the modern Church is embarrassed about this revealed truth, choosing rather to silence it than to explain it and defend it.

Philosophical Musings

Emily Finley writes on the role of imagination in life. She argues that conservatives, in reacting against romanticism, have undervalued the role of the imagination in forming a worldview.

What we would now dub “normie” conservatives have, historically, assumed that teaching the basics of the Christian faith, attending church on Sunday, and keeping out the overtly ideological material is generally sufficient for raising good kids. But what post-modernity and post-Boomer generation reality has taught us is that this is not enough—not nearly enough. The imaginations of young people, even those catechized, weekly-mass attenders, are being formed in large measure by the surrounding anti-Christian culture. Without a major intervention—largely removing children from the mainstream culture and practicing Christianity throughout the week and throughout the home—there is little hope of children keeping, much less passing on, the faith (to say nothing of their future happiness and ability to live life free from dependence on SSRI drugs).

Along similar lines, Robert Keim explains that we need poetry, not just facts (think of the famous Dickens character, Gradgrind); eloquence, not just information. With my emphasis:

No field of inquiry or endeavor—not history or philosophy, not even math or science, certainly not religion—can fully and properly enrich human life when we allow content to dominate form, facts to overwhelm wonder, precision to abuse beauty, certitude to bury mystery, convenience to banish poetry. To embrace this conclusion is to embrace that which is uniquely able to reopen a human mind, renew a human society, remake a human civilization. Indeed, it has renewed and remade my own life, which is what it now is in large part because of one sentence written almost as an afterthought by Dr. William Fahey, when comparing modern Bible translations to old “literary masterpieces” such as the King James Version: “Since spiritual mysteries can only be communicated through poetry, whatever more modern versions may gain in accuracy is nothing compared to what is lost.”

Illustrative of both the sanctified imagination and the peculiar power of what we might call sacramental poetry is Robert Lazu Kmita’s “Sacred Initiation and Baptismal Symbolism in Tolkien’s Stories”:

The metamorphosis of the personality of one who becomes a hero represents a distinct category of symbolic imagery intricately woven into the fabric of Tolkien’s novels…. For it is not enough merely to wish to defeat evil; one must become, through the metamorphosis of one’s own being, capable of doing so. This principle lies at the foundation of any religious initiatory rite, which finds its ultimate meaning in the supreme synthesis, of supernatural origin, of all these symbols of human transformation: Christian Baptism.

Kmita, incidentally, wrote a kind of response to Finley, concerning the difficulty of defining “romanticism” and why we should be careful about trapping artists in labels: “Gandalf and Tolkien Against Literary Labels and Analytical Spirit.”

In an article I would have missed but for an observant friend who spotted it, Esmé L. K. Partridge of the University of Cambridge dares to ask about something that is nearly a forbidden topic in today’s discourse: “Music and the Decline of Civilization.”

In almost every description of a declining civilization we find the same tropes: an excess of liberty, a confusion of social norms, and the weakening of authority that soon descends into lawlessness…. A popular anthropological theory, proposed by J. D. Unwin, is that social breakdown begins with an increase in prosperity and the weakening of sexual restraint. But another theory, perhaps overshadowed by these, once exerted a powerful influence over the premodern world: that the decline of a civilization can begin in the decline of its music. Indeed, unhealthy societies are often described as ‘discordant’ in figurative terms.

This is very much along the lines of what I argue in the first part of my book Good Music, Sacred Music, and Silence.

On Technology

The faster and more powerful our technology becomes, the more we hear (very possibly prophetic) voices sounding alarm bells, warning of immense social harm, and vaticanating apocalyptic scenarios. As far as I understand the information being analyzed, these people are not at all exaggerating. This week I have read a number of pieces that leave me aghast, though there was also one that gave me a bit of hope (it will be mentioned last).

In his “How I Was Taken Over by AI,” Robin Phillips tells us, with admirable candor, how he became addicted to AI and how it nearly destroyed his life — and he wonders if we are prepared for a widespread addiction. (Some time ago, I blurbed Phillips’s excellent book Are We All Cyborgs Now?: Reclaiming Our Humanity from the Machine.)

At the Substack Pilgrims in the Machine, Peco Gaskovski discusses a world-shaking problem that is not far away:

Optimists are still hoping for that future, but we might instead get a “quantum apocalypse”. According to a new piece in Wired by Amit Katwala:

"Cybersecurity analysts call this Q-Day—the day someone builds a quantum computer that can crack the most widely used forms of encryption. These math problems have kept humanity’s intimate data safe for decades, but on Q-Day, everything could become vulnerable, for everyone: emails, text messages, anonymous posts, location histories, bitcoin wallets, police reports, hospital records, power stations, the entire global financial system."

To be clear, this isn’t far-fetched fearmongering or the overactive imagination of some wacky tech-doomer. A survey of experts predicts a one-in-three chance that Q-Day happens before 2035 (and about 15% think it’s already happened in secret). It could be China that gets there first, or maybe the US. And when it does happen, it will change the world profoundly.

Forget a Star Trek future—it will be panic and chaos. Quantum machines could be used to shut down energy grids in cities, take down the banking system, disable missile silos, figure out where all the submarines are. And of course there will be no more secrets. “All confidence in the confidentiality of our communications will collapse,” Katwala writes.

The apocalypse does have its silver linings, argues Greg Cook: things are bad, but the badness has been repeatedly exposed to view, and this is beneficial to those of us who are seeking the truth — who want to escape from the clutches of the totalizing “metaverse.”

I said I’d end with a cause of hope. Admittedly, it’s only a touch of dawn, but the dawn seems to be brightening, as Jonathan Haidt explains in “Taking Back Childhood From Phones—Finally.”

Liturgical Lessons

Seminary shenanigans

I received a note from a seminarian who is praying the ancient breviary sub rosa:

Praying the breviary in Latin is frowned upon at my seminary very much. I noticed in the library the other day that the institution at some point took all of the [old] breviaries that could be used to pray the hours and removed them from the collection, I suspect to discourage the recitation of the Divine Office over liturgy of the hours.

Latin is a key to the vast treasure house of Western Christendom. This is why the progressives fear it so much and have done their best for 50+ years to suppress the knowledge of it. But, as a friend pointed out, this generation doesn’t even seem to realize that the kids know exactly where, on the internet, to find everything traditional. You can discard as many books as you want from your seminary shelves, but you won’t get rid of Divinum Officium, archive.org, and the like, not to mention reprints sprouting up everywhere.

Progressives, I have news for you: You are losing badly in the only battle that counts — the retention of youthful minds and hearts — and funnily enough, in your comfortable positions, you don’t even realize it. Maybe that’s just as well for the rest of us.

Speaking of breviaries…

The good monks of the Monastère Saint-Benoît in Brignoles, France, led by the intrepid Dom Alcuin Reid, have announced that their publishing arm, Pax Inter Spinas Editions, will be reprinting the traditional Monastic Breviary from 1963, with an appendix inclusive of pre-55 material.

In my article at New Liturgical Movement this week, I take up the question: “Do Priests or Religious Need Special Permission to Pray a Pre-55 Breviary?” A Polish canon lawyer wrote to me after reading this, objecting to my conclusion. Here is what I wrote in reply:

To my mind, the question of sin is very important because if a cleric has a solemn obligation to recite Breviary X or Y, then he does, in fact, sin by reciting some other breviary. That is why we speak of an obligation that “binds under pain of sin.”

It seems to me that there is a fundamental principle about which we disagree. I have come to think, after long study and reflection, that there is something inherently dangerous and unhealthy about the hyperpapalist position, according to which the pope has supreme power to alter any and all liturgical rites in any way he pleases, so long as he does not touch the “form and matter” of the sacraments. To me, this is absolutely not a Catholic mentality, and is incompatible with the attitude toward tradition that we find unanimously across all the centuries.

According to hyperpapalism, a pope could declare: “The breviary is now one psalm a day, picked by the cleric or religious himself. That's all. Every other breviary is forbidden.” And we would have to accept this. We’d have to call it the breviary. This is absurd. It would be equally absurd for a pope to say: “I don’t care if all the saints prior to today have recited Psalms 148, 149, and 150 at Lauds each day, as the Lord Jesus did in His life on earth. I tell you now, you must pray my breviary in which you say 148 on one day, 149 on another, and 150 on another. And praying the old one no longer counts; it’s abolished.”

This is not only legal positivism; it is illegal negativism. It has led to the near destruction of the Roman Rite. Enough is enough.

On the new iconoclasm

In an article written for Rorate Caeli, I explain the supreme irony of the Novus Ordo’s abolition of the special prayers used for St. John Damascene in which holy images, for which he struggled so much, are expressly mentioned and priased. This kind of cancellation, which was systematic both in the reform and in its implementation, is textbook iconoclasm: destroying what brings holy things, holy ones, to us in physical form — be that icons, statues, stained glass windows, high altars, architecture, furnishings, vestments, vessels, or the very prayers of the liturgy, which are physical as well as spiritual entities.

Out with weak religion

In a powerful essay at First Things (it may be behind a paywall, but ever since First Things has taken a postliberal and almost traditionalist turn, I decided to subscribe to it), Rusty Reno writes about “The Return of Strong Religion”:

One reason the Latin Mass appeals is that its archaic language and elaborate rituals convey something distant, shrouded in mystery. Faith inaugurates a long, arduous journey to a remote destination, a journey that will require our every strength. Rigor does not dismay or discourage. It motivates and inspires.

Moreover, in the Latin Mass, space is clearly demarcated. An altar rail protects the sacred from violation—and it protects the profane from exposure to the burning flames of holiness. “Woe is me,” says the prophet ­Isaiah, “for I am a man of unclean lips.” Sacred objects are handled with care. These practices inculcate reverence; more importantly, they remind us that God is frightful. When the angel of the Lord appeared to the shepherds, they were “sore afraid,” as the old translation puts it. They must be reassured: “Be not afraid.” But we cannot receive that good counsel if we never entertain the truth that we have very good reasons to fear God’s presence....

Tearing down the walls that separate the church from the world risks weakening Christianity’s defenses against the world’s seductions. It also removes the outward signs of the church’s difference from the world, bleaching out the gospel’s supernatural claim upon our lives.

What did Pius X have in mind?

Over at Crisis Magazine, you won’t want to miss Michael J. Ortiz’s superb (albeit somewhat misleadingly titled) article, “Contra Frequent Holy Communion?” For the author’s main point is that the CONTEXT in which St. Pius X believed Holy Communion would be distributed is vastly different from the context in the post-Vatican II Church, and that he would certainly not approve of the set of factors that now militates against fruitful communions.

Holy Week Resource

Those who will be attending Holy Week in its pre-55 form may find helpful a resource published by Os Justi Press, The Masses of Holy Week & Tenebrae, which contains the liturgy (in Latin with English translation) for Palm Sunday, the Triduum Masses, and the Office of Tenebrae — including the complete Gregorian chants. Summary rubrics are indicated. No page turning is required. The book features medieval illustrations in grayscale. Ideal as a hand missal, for study, or for singing (or all three). The cost for the 500-page paperback is $19.95.

The appeal of premodern religious art

“For many of us, especially those who feel spiritually out of sync with the modern world, there can be something irresistible in the sacred images of the early centuries of Christianity,” writes Hilary White, in “To venerate is to draw near: monastic art and the desire for communion.”

Miscellaneous

On foot to the Eternal City

Fr. Michael Rennier pens a fine review of Os Justi’s new edition of Belloc’s The Path to Rome.

Chronically short of money, his feet swollen and angry, the sole of his boot flapping in the dust of the Tuscan backroads, Hilaire Belloc seems to have no concept whatsoever of how a pilgrimage is supposed to work. Granted, he managed to tramp some 700 miles from his childhood village in France all the way to Rome, but most of his recollections of his time on the road are about the wine he drank and eccentric countryfolk he met while fording unfordable rivers and climbing unclimbable mountains. It really is a most unusual pilgrimage.

The body of the devil

Was it a gigantic crocodile? Or perhaps a whale? But what if it was a dragon? Or, who knows, maybe a gigantic sea serpent? As you probably anticipated, all these questions with uncertain answers refer to another rare creature described in the pages of the Bible: Leviathan.

This is the theme of Robert Lazu Kmita’s “The Body of the Devil and Leviathan: Saint Thomas Aquinas's Interpretation.” He continues:

In comparison to other strange beings in the Holy Scripture, this one enjoys a unique privilege. It is extensively described in an entire chapter—forty one—of the Book of Job. Of course, there are a few references to this monster. Reviewing them, we will rediscover that kind of ambiguity I noted in a previous article in the case of the gigantic being that swallowed the prophet John. An ambiguity which, however, is allowed by the author of the Holy books of the Bible, God, not to leave us in confusion, but, on the contrary, to challenge and guide our minds, thirsty for truth, towards the symbolic, i.e. spiritual meaning of this creature.

Traditionalism at 60

One might debate when exactly the traditionalist movement began. I think a key date is the founding of Una Voce, which seems to have happened in two stages: first in Paris in 1964, and then in Rome in 1966 (you will see both given in the literature). In any case, Timothy Flanders over at 1P5 is asking for writers to contribute materials relevant to “Traditionalism at 60.”

Thanks for reading, and may God bless you!